


Not Forever

by BeifongFirebender



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Character Death, Death, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-16 18:49:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21275996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeifongFirebender/pseuds/BeifongFirebender
Summary: We were never given closure over Sokka's death, so here is my version of events. (Tokka canon, Suyin as their daughter, because we all know she is...)





	Not Forever

**Author's Note:**

> I always hated how in LoK some Gaang members were just dead. Like, no explanation, no context, nothing about what happened, they’re just dead and away from the story.
> 
> It’s all Saints’ Day here, and we’re visiting graves and honoring our loved ones so I thought it’d be appropriate if I posted my version of how we lost Sokka.

Under any other circumstances Suyin loved visiting her father’s home, the South Pole. But not like this…

She was woken by a panicked radio call from Katara that morning before the sun was even up, and several hours later, here she was on the back of Tenzin’s Oogi, landing onto a snow-covered meadow. Her eldest son, Junior, was beside her, silently admiring the vastness of the mountains in the distance. If they were here for any other reason, she would have smiled at him, showed him around and took him to see the view from the highest peak. But today was not a day like that….

Su said a quick goodbye to Tenzin, who had other matters to attend to, and hurried towards Katara’s house. The woman moved there when she lost her husband, and spent her days mostly giving healing lessons, only practicing it herself in special cases. One of those happened yesterday. The only thing Katara said on the radio was the Sokka was hurt. Hurt badly. She didn’t really need to say anything else to get Su packing, but she added _on his death bed_ just in case.

“Mother, is it long before we’re there?” Junior asked and suddenly Su noticed she was trudging through the snow so fast her son wasn’t able to keep up. She turned back and one look at his shivering hands and fogged up glasses was enough to make her slow down.

“Just a little more, dear.” She took one of his hands and rubbed it between her own. They hadn’t packed any scarfs or gloves. It was all in such hurry. Her husband had to stay behind to watch the younger kids. “Are you cold?”

“Yes, but I can take it for a little more.”

Katara greeted them with hugs at the door. She was a bit surprised to see Junior, but she didn’t voice it. It took one waterbending move to get the snow off them and their clothes, afterwards she led them to a little room.

After the speed with which Su marched to the house, she was surprised to feel her steps slowing. She was afraid. Afraid of how her father may look. Afraid to see him weak and all but gone.

“He’s not conscious,” Katara added, as to hurry her along. This must not have been easy on the older woman either, but she was adept at not showing it.

The room smelt terrible. Like sweat mixed in with at least a dozen floral aromas. There was a bed in the middle, where Chief Sokka was lying, his face a permanent frown from his ongoing battle with the fever. And there, right by his side, Toph sat stoically with her head faced down.

“Mom?”

“Hi, baby Su.”

“How long have you-”

“Through the night.” Toph raised her head, but turned it not towards her daughter, but her grandson, who was carefully cleaning his glasses. “Which one is that?”

“This is Bataar Junior, Mom. He’s twelve now.”

“Is he?” Toph shrugged. “Never would have guessed by the size of him…”

“I’m taller than you,” the boy snapped.

“Oh, I like this one. Come give your old grandma a hug…”

Toph’s grandkids were the only people alive she made this offer to, without being sarcastic.

“Yeah, I realize it now…” she said after the hug. “You’ve grown. You’ll be bending rocks big as mountains one day.”

“Not a bender,” Su corrected.

“Lifting them then, damn if I know…” Toph mumbled to herself.

“Junior, would you please go with Katara and eat something? I’ll join you later.”

The boy nodded and followed the waterbender out of the room. Now that it was just mother and daughter, Toph returned to her original pose while Su paced in a circle.

“How… How did this happen?! Who was it? Who would dare?!”

“From what I understand,” started Toph. “It went down like this… Your dad was just casually strolling the street like any other old-timer might do on a sunny morning. But there was a robbery. He stumbled into the crooks by pure coincidence. And then he charged at them, by himself, like he was 24, not 74, and got stabbed a few times for his troubles.”

Su moved her gaze over to her father, looking for injuries. Any he may have would be concealed by the blanket that covered him. She was actually glad about that. He shifted slightly, still under the fever and she suddenly regretted bringing her son here. It was immensely painful for her to watch her father like this, she didn’t want Junior feeling like that.

“Didn’t anyone help him? Can’t Katara heal him?” Su realized how obnoxious she sounded, but she couldn’t help it. Her father was Chief, but that didn’t mean he had to do everything alone. And she was far too accustomed to healing as a normal part of life, to accept someone dying from a few stabs.

“She did. Did a fine job, as far as I can tell.” Toph spoke with the cold and detached voice she used for her job as a police chief, yet Su could see this was hitting her hard. “She patched him up, but now she says he’s fighting an infection. There’s little she can do about that, other than stuff him full of healing herbs tea and wait… So we’ve been waiting.”

“Have you eaten anything, Mom?” Suyin asked, her voice suddenly gentle.

“Su, if you’re in the mood for mothering and doting over someone, I think you’ve got enough kids. Leave me very well out of it…”

“Just come eat some soup with me and your grandson. It’ll just take a few minutes.” Su needed a way to help and she seemed to have found it. Katara could take care of Sokka, Su would take care of her mother.

“No,” Toph insisted.

“Why?”

“I… I’m not leaving this room.”

“It’ll be fine, you’re not-”

“I’m listening.” Toph said and rocked her feet slightly, to explain her meaning. She was listening to Sokka’s heartbeat all thought the night and even now. Su almost burst into tears right there and then thinking about it. All the people always talked about Katara and Aang’s great love, but no one could talk about her parents, because almost no one knew. Theirs was always a subtle and whispered kind of love, but that didn’t make it any less real.

“I’ll have Junior bring you your food then.” Su said.

“Why’d you bring him anyway?”

“It’s his grandfather. He might never get the chance to-”

“I don’t know what kind of ideas Katara’s been feeding you, but he’s waking up from this!” Toph treated the insinuation like a personal insult.

“I know, I hope so, but we can’t deny the fact that-”

“Katara is being overly-dramatic, like always. He’s come back from worst scraps than that one. You don’t even know, baby Su! Agh… There was this one time with this all-girls marching band…” Her voice died down as Sokka’s mumbling started turning into words.

“Aang… Aang,” he called, still overtaken by the fever. “Aang, come here. You have to see… See… Kya’s bending. Aang…”

“That’s why Katara can’t be in this room.” Toph said, seeing her daughter both relieved to hear him speaking and terrified because he was delirious. “He’s sort of stuck in his past and he’s saying stuff like he’s there, calling out for Twinkle Toes every two seconds like he’ll hear him somehow. I guess, it’s funny how even like this, he misses him. Anyway, it’s destroying Katara to hear him calling out for Aang, so I told her to get out if she’s not healing him.”

“Mom.”

“What?”

“Toph…” Sokka spoke again, his voice shaky, but louder this time.

“I’m here, dumbass,” she answered, even though it was still a fever dream. He wasn’t there with them. Not really.

“Toph… You mustn’t trust Long Feng.”

“I won’t. Promise.” She took a freshly washed cloth and used it to wipe some of the sweat off his face.

“I know how we can bypass them. We’ll take the secret tunnel.” He seemed almost upset saying that.

“Yeah, sure.” Toph wiped his forehead again. “I’ll take the secret tunnel with you, no problem. Lead the way.”

Su felt her throat tighten again, like she was about to start sobbing, so she decided to go eat something. After all, it wasn’t like she could do anything to help either of her parents at this point.

She looked back into the room from the hall, and she could have sworn she saw her mother bend down and plant a kiss on her father’s forehead. Now Su was crying, but it was all contained by the time she made it to the kitchen.

**oooooooooo**

They spent the entire rest of the day waiting. Su helped Katara a bit around the house, just to feel useful, but her aunt was reluctant to let her. Su insisted and soon found out keeping herself busy was the only thing keeping Katara from crying. The feeling of helplessness was getting to her too. It was getting to all of them, since Sokka was just lying there in pain and not one of them could help him even a little bit.

Junior talked to Toph for a while, as long as she’d let him. Then he was given a book and sent to the adjoining room. When his mother went to check in on him several hours later, she found him sleeping. She thought it unusual until she realized it was far past midnight, and they were the ones out of the ordinary. But Su didn’t feel like sleeping. She’d only just gotten here. It’s her mother and Katara that needed it.

“He’s sleeping.” Su announced, returning to her father’s room. She found Katara going over his wounds with her healing water again, trying to see if there was anything else she could do. By the look on her face, there wasn’t.

“Finally.” Toph still sat in the exact same place, in the exact same pose.

“Mom!”

“What? He’s been talking my ear off since he got here.”

“He asked you how you’re doing.” Su sat down.

“Exactly,” Toph said. “You should have left that kid at home.”

Su resented that comment when she heard it, but in the last few hours she came to that same conclusion on her own. Why _did_ she bring him?

Maybe it was just selfishness. He was the only one old enough and she wanted someone here who was hers. Someone whose presence gave her comfort, someone who reminded her of home in this hard time.

But it wasn’t fair.

Toph realized her daughter wasn’t going to argue back and turned towards Katara. “And you, stop splashing him with that thing! He just needs to sleep it off.”

“He’s halfway into a coma, Toph. This is serious, I need you to understand that.” Katara said those words like she wanted to hurt the other woman. Like it was some accomplishment of hers. “You’ll be sorry after, if you don’t accept what is happening here!”

“After what exactly?! After he wakes up and I tell him I’m the only one that believed in him while the two of you were mewling like babies.”

“It’s not about believing, it’s about accepting-”

“Spirits!” Su jerked in the chair she was sitting in. “Lin! Did anyone tell Lin? When is she getting here?”

Suyin and her sister weren’t exactly on speaking terms for the last… More than fifteen years, really. But they could put their grievances aside for Sokka, couldn’t they? Su knew she could, she only hoped Lin wouldn’t start anything… She even secretly hoped this would give her and her sister some time alone for apologies and maybe even a reconciliation. What would she even say?

“I already called Lin, sweetie,” Katara interrupted her thoughts. “Right after I called you.”

“Good. So how far out can she be by now?” Su imagined Lin walking into that room. At that point, she hadn’t seen her sister in more than a decade, not counting newspaper articles, so she imagined Lin in her twenties running in there. Lin without her scars, wrinkles and grey hair, that Su knew her sister had now. What could Su say to her? Would a hug be okay? Maybe just a nod was enough… Whatever the case, Su knew she couldn’t stop herself from crying if she saw Lin cry. It was like that ever since they were very little.

“That’s the thing, Su… I told her everything that happened here, how _serious_ it was.” Katara spared a glance at Toph and the woman scoffed. “And she… She hung up on me.”

Su couldn’t believe the words she was hearing. “As in, she’s not coming?”

Katara let a few silent seconds pass until she nodded.

“Unbelievable!” Su stood up, looking like she wanted to fight someone. How dare Lin just…

“He’s not her dad, Su,” Toph added. “I didn’t see you crying when her father died…”

“That is not even remotely the same thing… She knew my dad! He…” He played with her, tutored her, took her to the father-daughter school dance. He cried when he heard her and Tenzin broke up. “He treated her like she was his daughter. He loved her! And after all that to just pretend-”

“Loves. He _loves_ her,” Toph corrected.

“You know what I mean…” Su could understand Lin not wanting to see her or Mom ever again. Spirits know, she felt that way most days, but Sokka… He never did anything, he was never anything but loving and supporting to all three of them. Whether they deserved it or not. “It’s no miracle she has no one left in her life… She doesn’t care about any of us! Not really.”

“Suyin, she has a city to take care of. Maybe she wants to be here, but can’t,” Katara said.

“No, she’s just a cold, selfish bitch! I have infant twins at home who need me, who I miss every second, and I still managed to show up. I will never forgive her for this, I swear to everything that is…”

“Su!” Sokka yelled this time, and Su thought he was conscious for a second. She ran to his bedside and took his hand.

“Yes, Dad?”

“Su…” He sounded worse. “I’m sorry…”

The pause was so long, she felt compelled to say something. “What for?”

“I’m sorry, but you have to go to school, dear.” His next few sentences were too mumbled to recognize. Su just stood there listening anyway, wondering if her father will ever open his eyes again and really see her.

“His heartbeat is going crazy,” Toph said.

“Katara, we have to find Aang an earthbending teacher. We have to hurry!” Sokka continued.

“Don’t worry, old man.” Toph took his hand. “You found her.”

**oooooooooo**

Sokka’s condition kept getting worse through the night, and Suyin was determined to wait by his side. Her mother kept insisting this was just temporary, but stayed awake too.

Su tried calling Baatar, ignoring how late it was, and to her surprise he picked up.

“How are the twins?”

“What do you think? Missing their mommy,” Baatar said over the radio. “For the record, so am I. How are things on your end?”

Su swallowed hard. “Not great. My mother is… My mother and Dad’s not waking up. How about Huan and Opal?”

“Good, I think. To be honest I barely saw them today… Kuvira took care of them all on her own. Who knew she was so good at taking initiative?”

“I knew I should have left her in charge…” Su smiled. It was the first time she’d done that since she heard the news about her dad.

“He’s going to be okay, Su. You just have to be patient. And don’t worry about us one bit. Give Junior a kiss from me.”

“I will. You need to kiss everyone from me… I love you.”

“Love you, too, honey.”

Even after the call ended, Su stayed by the radio, listening to the static. She wasn’t sure how long she sat there for, but the place had a good view of the door. For some reason, she expected Lin to come running through it. Now. No, now. Now!

Su could almost see it. Her sister running inside, half-frozen, saying she got held up, but wouldn’t stop fighting to be here. Of course, Lin couldn’t heal Sokka, even if she did come, but to Su it felt like it would make everything a little better. A little less pointless.

But Lin didn’t come.

At some point, Su lay down on the sofa in the corner of the room to rest her eyes and fell asleep there. She was awoken early in the morning by giggling. Her son’s giggling. She opened her eyes and saw her father was not only awake but sitting up and talking to Junior and her mother.

“Dad?” she asked carefully, worried she was wrong about his condition yet again.

“Didn’t I tell you he’ll wake up?” Toph gloated, a big smile on her face. “Small misadventure, nothing so dramatic.”

“True, but I would not like to repeat it anytime soon,” Sokka said, before turning his head and all of his attention towards his daughter. “Hi, Su. Come here.”

Su hurried forward without a word and gave her father a hug, maybe a bit too forcefully.

“Not so hard, killer. I need these bones…” he laughed to himself and Su gently pulled away, wiping the tears from her eyes. She didn’t usually like for her mother to see, or rather hear, her cry, but she couldn’t help it.

“When did you wake up?” she asked.

“Not long ago. You were snoring on the couch, your mother in the chair… The only voice I heard was my grandson, reading to me.”

“Junior?” Su looked to her son.

“I just didn’t want him to be lonely.” The boy shrugged.

“Before you react,” started Toph. “I need to mention that it was a book about tower cranes.”

“Of course, it was.” Su pulled the boy into a tight hug and kissed the top of his head. She found herself unable to stop smiling.

“It’s an interesting subject matter. I thought Grandpa would appreciate it.” Junior fought and failed to get out of his mother’s grip.

“I do, kiddo.” Sokka said.

“What are you doing?!” Katara yelled from the door. “You should be lying down!”

“Oh, come on, Katara… I feel great! More than great. Ten years younger,” Sokka insisted.

“You are just beginning to heal. Down!”

“I wouldn’t kid around with her. She will tackle you,” Toph said and watched him lie back.

“Can I at least change into something clean and belonging to me, please?”

“I don’t have any of your clothes, except the ones covered in blood and holes.” Katara gave him a brownish liquid to drink.

“Well, those are bad luck, obviously.”

“I’ll go get your clothes from the house, Dad.” Su volunteered, already putting on her jacket. “You want to come with me, Junior?”

“I have some nice construction books back home…” Sokka offered and the boy agreed to come. While he was putting on his jacket, Su kissed her father’s cheek, before heading out the door.

“I love you, Dad!” she yelled back.

“Love you, too.”

**oooooooooo**

The weather was quite nice that morning, so Su and Junior made quick time walking to Sokka’s house and back. Su brought a whole bag of clothes with her, since she wanted her father to have choices, while her son took not one, not two, but four books from the bookshelf.

Katara let them in again, and Junior proceeded to show her every book he took, one by one, with explanation on why he found them interesting.

“Junior, don’t bother Katara while she’s-” Su started, but Katara stopped her with a wave.

“It’s fine.” The woman stirred something on the stove with her waterbending. “You go tell your parents we’ll be eating soon.

Su smiled back, seeing her son continuing his monologue on bulldozers and Katara listening to him like it was the most interesting subject in the world. She grabbed the bag of clothes and hurried to her father’s room. She pushed the door open gently, finding her mother sitting on the bed next to her father’s lying form. He looked to be sleeping peacefully for the first time since this all started. Then Su noticed her mother’s face was anything but peaceful.

“Come on, wake up, dummy.” Toph whispered and slightly nudged him. “Wake up.”

“Mom? What’s going on?” Su asked, hoping to get a sarcastic snip back.

“I can’t feel it anymore.”

Su instantly understood. “Dad… Dad!” She rushed to his side and started shaking him. “Dad! Katara! Dad… Please.”

“What is it?!” Katara yelled from the kitchen and Su could feel her footsteps rushing to them.

“Maybe if I got closer,” Toph whispered to herself and kneeled on the floor, touching it with both her palms completely. “Still can’t feel it… Must be my bending getting old.”

But Sokka’s heartbeat was gone.

Toph was completely lying on the floor, mumbling to herself, when Katara rushed in. She tried everything she knew how with her bending water, while Su called for her dad again and again. Junior watched all of this, unsure of what to do.

When Katara finally put down her hands and allowed her bending water to splash onto the floor, Su already felt like she was out of tears. As she would find out in the next few hours, that was not true, but just then, that’s how it felt.

The first thing she did was send Junior out of the room to call his father. The boy was in a bit of a shock, there was nothing anyone could do about that anymore. She kissed his forehead before he left and he gave her a hug, that almost brought the tears back. But she somehow managed to focus most of her mind on her mother, who was still lying on the floor, barely moving.

It’s not that Su wanted her mother to scream and cry, but what Toph was doing was not a normal reaction to the love of your life dying. Katara was also very still in her crying, but she was sitting next to her brother and saying goodbye. Saying everything she wanted to say.

Suyin knelt near her mother and pondered briefly about how to start, but Toph beat her to it.

“I can’t feel him anymore, Su…” Toph lifted her head to look at her daughter.

“I know. I… He’s not here anymore, Mom. It’s not coming back.” Su covered her mouth before she could say anything else. She didn’t mean to sound so… Cold. She was just so new to this. Her mind was in complete chaos, she had no idea how she was supposed to help someone else cope.

There was a moment of silence before Toph sat up, gave Su a pat on the shoulder and turned towards the outer wall of the room, which opened for her, letting the snow and the cold wind into the room.

“Mom! Mom, you can’t just leave!” Su yelled as Toph stepped outside slowly. “You can’t leave-”

The wall closed back up, leaving Su staring directly at it in the place where her mother had been.

“- me.”

Katara took her hand.

“She’ll be fine. Trust me, I know her.”

“Fine?!” Su knew she shouldn’t, but she yelled. “She is barefoot, and it is freezing out there! I have to go find her before-”

“I promise you, she’ll be fine. She always comes back.”

Katara was only half right. Toph did return the next day, having given the South Pole a new canyon to remember the night, but Su didn’t see her for a very long time after the funeral.

“When Aang died,” Katara begun, to break the silence. “We were all alone at home. He didn’t get to see our children one more time, nor they him. I’m sure Sokka was so happy to be able to see you today.”

“Spirits, Katara, stop!” Su wiped her runaway tears.

“I’ll make us some tea, that’ll help.”

“Fire! Fire!” yelled Junior from the kitchen. Katara had left the food cooking and there was a medium sized fire developing around it. It didn’t take the waterbender long to extinguish it.

“Sorry, I didn’t see it sooner, Mom.” Junior apologized.

“It’s alright.”

“Dad wants to talk to you.”

Su took a deep breath and walked to the radio. Hearing Baatar’s voice helped. It gave Su strength for the calls she had to make soon after.

**oooooooooo**

The funeral procession a few days later was the biggest the South Pole had ever seen. Poetry was read, stories and anecdotes told, and no one was left unaffected. The common people cried and cursed the thieves who brought this on.

Su hated all of it. The fakeness of it. In her opinion, her father never got the respect her deserved. Not for his part in ending the war, not for his part in repairing the Tribe and not for his part in keeping the world safe. She knew he wouldn’t approve of her thinking that way, but she blamed the people here for leaving him to almost bleed out in the mud, alone, because he tried to help them.

Katara gave an amazing speech about hope. Zuko’s talked about devotion. Toph’s was two sentences long, so the theme is hard to pinpoint. Su didn’t give a speech at all. It was easy to forget sometimes, but the world still didn’t know he was her father and she was determined to keep it that way, now more than ever. There was once a time they talked about this moment and they planned Suyin would stand up at his funeral, share the truth and become his successor as Chief. But she didn’t want to lead these people. She had her place. It was with her husband, her children and their city. She wouldn’t repeat her father’s mistake, she wouldn’t separate herself from them for this ungrateful, unhospitable and unforgiving place.

Su preferred the second ceremony. The one with just the family and close friends.

Just like with Aang’s grave, the public wasn’t aware where Sokka’s was burried. And they were both in the same place, side by side. Not far from the settlements, but far enough to be private, next to the half-frozen river, the closest place on solid ground they could find to the spot where Katara and Sokka found Aang all those decades ago.

Katara remembered a few years ago when Sokka dug Aang’s grave here.

_“Are you sure it’s good enough?” she had asked._

_“Are you kidding me?” Sokka smiled. “He chose it himself.”_

**oooooooooo**

A day after the ceremony, everyone returned to their duties. Suyin went back to her children and her city, Katara moved to stay with Tenzin for a while and Toph went off to somewhere in the Earth Kingdom.

There was no one at Sokka’s grave when Lin made her way to it from the forest. But that was the idea.

She brought flowers and incense with her, not really knowing if it was right. She’d never done that alone before that day, but she tried to remember what they brought to Aang’s grave years earlier. Watching the smoke rise, she finally satisfied her unbelievable urge to speak, despite the fact there was no one there to hear her. Maybe even because of that fact…

“Hi, so I… I’m sorry, I…” Lin coughed a few times to clear her throat. “I wanted to come, the thing is… I knew Su would be there and we’d fight. And you hated that. We shouldn’t make you being hurt about us, right… And I thought she should be the one with you because she is… Was your real, you know…”

Lin then took a few moments to let the feeling of being utterly ridiculous wash over her. Then she carried on. Not like she had a living person she could talk to this about… Not anymore.

“Anyway, I…” Tears started draining down her face suddenly, taking her by surprise since she was completely calm just a breath ago. She wiped them away.

She never had a problem talking to Sokka while he was alive. It finally hit her she’ll never be able to do that again.

“I… I thought the words would just come to me when I was here. But I guess you always did most of the talking… It’s good that you got to be with Su when you…” Her cheeks needed wiping again. “I know you loved her. And Mom. And, you know… And you knew how I felt about you. I didn’t call you Dad, but I… I actually did once, you just didn’t hear it. I was a kid and just trying it out, but Mom being who she is just laughed and told me I was wrong.” Lin gave up on controlling her tears all together. “But you were… That to me. I’m just sorry I was scared to ever repeat it. Oh, Spirits… I should have come yesterday, right?

“Instead I worked as always… I caught this really bad guy. Like really bad… You’d approve. Of course, you would… People say I’m a spitting image of Mom, but she can walk away from things. You never could. You couldn’t let those robbers go…” Lin smiled then, through the tears. “Neither could I. So you can rest now… I’ll be here to fight for the world. Su can hide in her city, Mom wherever she’s gone, and Tenzin with that woman… I’ll never stop fighting just like you.”

Suddenly, Lin went quiet and heard footsteps behind her. She wiped her tears in panic and took a deep breath to calm herself. Then she turned.

Behind her Bumi and Izumi slowly stepped closer, holding hands. She expected the questions to start as they drew near. They were at the funeral for sure, they knew she missed it…

But instead Bumi just stopped a few paces from her and opened his arms. She walked into the hug and accidentally let a few new tears escape. Izumi gave them a moment before joining in the hug as well.

“What are you doing here?” Lin asked, pulling away.

“We were there yesterday for the send-off and… Bumi?” Izumi turned to her boyfriend.

“Well, you see, Lin, we couldn’t leave because… Izumi wasn’t feeling well,” he mumbled out.

“Bumi!” She shot him a glare.

“What’s going on between you two?” Lin asked, her sorrow pushed aside for now.

“Fine…” Bumi sighed. “I guessed that you’d show up late. I didn’t want you here alone, and since I knew you’d be avoiding a number of other people I figured… We’d surprise you here.”

Lin should have been mad in that moment. She hated pity. And she was perfectly fine doing this and a great number of other things in life alone… Yet this felt good. This helped.

“Nice of you,” she said. “But I’m alright. He was your uncle.”

Bumi nodded. “He was more. They said he had no children at the funeral yesterday… But he was something to all of us, there will never be someone like that again.” He rubbed his hand over the right side of his face. Izumi squeezed his shoulder briefly.

“We were thinking we’d spend the day with you,” the Princess added. “And then head back to Republic City together.”

“I am perfectly capable of getting on a boat by myself, thank you very much…” Lin said.

“That might be true…” Bumi began. “But we have to go meet our daughter in the city.”

“What’s Thi Na doing alone in Republic City?” Lin already had a dozen disaster scenarios in her mind about the Princess’ visit. And she wasn’t there to stop any of them from turning into a reality.

“Playing a gig with her band, if you can believe it,” Izumi said before laughing at herself.

“She’s in a band?” Lin tried to ask with a serious voice, but distinctly failed.

“You know, teenagers… She’s just finding her thing.”

“And we’re being supportive, right, honey?” Bumi asked.

“We are,” Izumi nodded and turned to Lin. “It’s just that she’s changing her mind so often, it’s hard.”

“I thought writing was her thing?” Lin asked, remembering that the last time she had time to discuss their daughter for longer than a few seconds was years ago.

“Yeah, she’s still on that too,” Izumi said. “But you don’t need to worry, she has escorts and I’ve sent Iroh right after the funeral to go and check up on her.”

The older siblings never get a break, Lin knew it all too well.

“And there’s the other thing,” Bumi said.

“It’s not a thing, I don’t think…”

“Is someone a little avoidant?” Bumi turned back towards the settlements, and Izumi followed his lead. Soon all three of them were trudging through snow away from the graves.

“No…” Izumi shook her head.

“Then tell Lin. We have time.”

Izumi sighed and made eye contact with Lin, but no words were coming out.

“What?” the earthbender asked.

“It’s just my dad…” the Princess finally started. “Every time one of his friends dies, he gets…”

“Sappy,” Bumi interrupted. “You should have seen him yesterday…”

“Anyway, he also starts thinking about his own mortality, I guess. And he starts being really pushy about giving up his place as Fire Lord to me.”

“Oh.” Lin really didn’t know what to say to that.

“Tell her she’ll be an amazing Fire Lord!” Bumi cut in. “Tell her the Fire Nation should be so luck to get her as-”

“Oh, shut up…” Izumi shoved him. “I’m just saying if I were avoiding my father a tiny bit, it’s because he’s pressuring me.”

“But you always knew it was coming,” Lin said.

“I did, of course. Ever since I knew what it meant, but… This is different. He actually talked about it like he’d do it any day now. I just don’t think I’m ready. He is the best Fire Lord we ever had. I don’t think I’m up to following that.”

Lin noticed Bumi giving her a weird look after Izumi confessed that. Then she got it. He may be here to console her, but he was also here so Lin could talk some sense into Izumi. And she was pretty sure she knew what he wanted her to say.

“I hated following my mother as the Chief of Police. It’s been decades since she quit now, and people still talk about her like she never did a wrong thing in her life… But…” Lin turned and stole a glance at the now very distant graves. “No matter who they are, they’re not forever. We have to step up eventually.”

**Author's Note:**

> So that’s it… It took me a while to write, like all sad things always do, but I powered through and I hope it’s at least okay.
> 
> I don’t write many death scenes so I’m still learning how to get them right.
> 
> After how hard this is I don’t think I could handle Aang’s death. Even mentioning it as a thing in the past hurt. My God, I’m too attached to those characters…
> 
> Side note, I mentioned Thi Na here, that’s my OC, she’s Bumizumi’s daughter and I introduced her in my previous story…
> 
> Anyway, I had the whole thing with the Beifong feud to think about while also showing Lin cared about Sokka a lot so I hope you like how I saw it. I may do some other Gaang deaths later because we need closure over here! At least I do. I already did Suki in another story.
> 
> Comments are always appreciated… :)


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